Shared stand-up electric scooters are now offered in many cities as an option for short-term rental, and marketed for short-distance travel. Using life cycle assessment, we quantify the total environmental impacts of this mobility option associated with global warming, acidification, eutrophication, and respiratory impacts. We find that environmental burdens associated with charging the e-scooter are small relative to materials and manufacturing burdens of the e-scooters and the impacts associated with transporting the scooters to overnight charging stations. The results of a Monte Carlo analysis show an average value of life cycle global warming impacts of 202 g CO 2 -eq/passenger-mile, driven by materials and manufacturing (50%), followed by daily collection for charging (43% of impact). We illustrate the potential to reduce life cycle global warming impacts through improved scooter collection and charging approaches, including the use of fuel-efficient vehicles for collection (yielding 177 g CO 2 -eq/passenger-mile), limiting scooter collection to those with a low battery state of charge (164 g CO 2 -eq/passenger-mile), and reducing the driving distance per scooter for e-scooter collection and distribution (147 g CO 2 -eq/passenger-mile). The results prove to be highly sensitive to e-scooter lifetime; ensuring that the shared e-scooters are used for two years decreases the average life cycle emissions to 141 g CO 2 -eq/passenger-mile. Under our Base Case assumptions, we find that the life cycle greenhouse gas emissions associated with e-scooter use is higher in 65% of our Monte Carlo simulations than the suite of modes of transportation that are displaced. This likelihood drops to 35%-50% under our improved and efficient e-scooter collection processes and only 4% when we assume two-year e-scooter lifetimes. When e-scooter usage replaces average personal automobile travel, we nearly universally realize a net reduction in environmental impacts.
Decarbonizing power systems is a critical component of climate change mitigation, which can have public health cobenefits by reducing air pollution. Many studies have examined strategies to decarbonize power grids and quantified their health cobenefits. However, few of them focus on near-term cobenefits at community levels, while comparing various decarbonization pathways. Here, we use a coupled power system and air quality modeling framework to quantify the costs and benefits of decarbonizing the Texas power grid through a carbon tax; replacing coal with natural gas, solar, or wind; and internalizing human health impacts into operations. Our results show that all decarbonization pathways can result in major reductions in CO 2 emissions and public health impacts from power sector emissions, leading to large net benefits when considering the costs to implement these strategies. Operational changes with existing infrastructure can serve as a transitional strategy during the process of replacing coal with renewable energy, which offers the largest benefits. However, we also find that Black and lower-income populations receive disproportionately higher air pollution damages and that none of the examined decarbonization strategies mitigate this disparity. These findings suggest that additional interventions are necessary to mitigate environmental inequity while decarbonizing power grids.
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